


elegy sans gas

by Ghoulie_cruz



Category: Cowboy Bebop (Anime)
Genre: A Really Good Fucking, Bounty Hunters, Emotional Constipation, Epiphanies, IN SPACE!, M/M, Nightmares, Rare Pairings, Teasing, midnight conversation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-15
Updated: 2020-04-15
Packaged: 2021-03-01 16:48:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23660341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghoulie_cruz/pseuds/Ghoulie_cruz
Summary: Hey, Jet, wanna hear something funny?
Relationships: Jet Black & Spike Spiegel, Jet Black/Spike Spiegel
Comments: 34
Kudos: 131





	elegy sans gas

**Author's Note:**

> I know this fandom is dead (which sucks) but I wrote this for myself, anyway. 
> 
> This is riddled with Bebop references, so if you get lost, do yourself a solid and watch the show. Songs are _Daily Battles_ by Thom Yorke & Flea, _I Get Nervous_ by Lower Dens, _Jóga_ by Björk and _Either Way I Lose_ by Nina Simone. There’s a homage or two to Ryu Murakami’s _Almost Transparent Blue_

“ _If travel is certain, and home has been found, I’m not stopping. I’m going hunting_ "

—Hunter, Björk

* * *

Jet is quiet. 

Jet’s _always_ quiet. 

Sometimes he doesn’t speak for days. Not that Spike’s one to talk. Ask him what’s on his mind and, at best, you’ll get a vacant stare, a vague _hn_ or if you’ve _really_ hit the jackpot, get the sound of him walking away. You see, Jet and Spike, they’ve got enough on their plate, got enough clogging up the metaphorical sink _—_ guns, hunger, money, guilt _—_ without laying on awkward words, stunted answers, pensive shrugs. 

At the bedroom window, Spike lights a cigarette. 

Casts a sideways glance at Jet and resumes his guarded contemplation. His reflection is a ghost. It hovers like a hologram, too lean, buckled in the middle like the smoke that’s stuck between his lips. He looks across the stars, forgotten satellites, junk tin cans. Thoughts rise like bubbles to the surface, break like a finch in careless hands. 

_Hey Julia, where are you?_

_I think I’d like to see you. Just once more, you know?_

Eyes bore into the void, mismatched eyes, one in the present, one shuffling through dim-lit memories like a deck of playing cards; diamonds, aces, hearts. It clamps around his gut, the void. Gets him thinking far too much. 

Julia. Vicious. Jet. 

He thinks about his life: pretty good, not bad. Jet often says _room for improvement_. Spike thinks he might take Jet up, learn something new, stop getting so thrashed when he leaves the Bebop. Maybe cook once in a while. 

But then he gets so tired. 

He smokes and smokes and smokes. Smokes until his fingers turn piss yellow, until the haze obscures the room. Smokes until his lungs give up, send him coughing into sleep, naked, drenched in sweat and shaking, goosebumps crawling on his skin.

He says to Jet, eyes fixed on space, “Do you miss the rain in Ganymede?”

“Sure. I guess.”

“How it comes down.” Spike's tone turns wistful. Flattens his palm to the cold glass. “Drips from the eaves, pools on the ground. I miss it too—the rain. Not being out in it, you know? Just watching it wash the concrete. Clean away the filth. The dog shit. Push it deep into the drains. Send the city crud out to the sea.”

Spike can feel Jet’s wary gaze.

“You getting sick, kid?”

“Dunno,” Spike replies, not really listening. Maybe his head does throb. Maybe his chest feels tight.

“You eat like crap.”

“You eat the same.”

“Least I peel an orange, now and then.”

 _These Foolish Things_ floats eerily from a record player in the mess hall that Jet left on, the guy always weak for Charlie Parker. 

“What do you want? You want a prize? And, oh”—Spike jams his hand in his pocket, pulls it out, middle finger raised. He waves it in the air—“fuck you. I just asked a fucking question. Doesn’t qualify me for bedrest unless you want to play my nurse.” Spike smirks despite himself. Knows how it rubs Jet the wrong way, when he calls Jet out for caring, ‘cause that’s what that gaze was. What it still is. The way that Jet thinks he might break, both of them stretched so thin, like a length of cheap string tied to a brick that’s slowly sinking, the only thing preventing then from snapping being the drag of the rock that anchors them from the edge.

Concern and how it _rankles_.

Spike’s been taking care of himself for about as long as his dick’s been getting hard. He doesn’t need a mother. 

Still, he doesn’t argue when Jet just shakes his head, steps away from the glass, strides to the bed. He stays put, with his smart mouth shut, as Jet picks up a blanket, backtracks across the room to wrap the wool around Spike’s shoulders, saying as he turns to leave, “I’ll make some tea.”

* * *

Spike remembers their first time; in the Swordfish, of all places. Jet sitting in the pilot’s chair, Spike tucked under the dash barking orders for Jet to hit the ignition, check if the dials jump back to life. The shift came with a single action, Spike on his knees between Jet’s legs when he finally crawled back to the light. The thrill of Jet’s sharp inhale. The boldness of Spike’s hands as they settled, dirty as they were and still in gloves, on Jet’s thick thighs. 

Those same thighs are now flush with Spike’s where he straddles Jet on their banged-up couch.

“Tell me what you want,” Jet breathes, toothpaste and ash. He’s got his fingers in Spike’s hair. His unruly mop, it flops forward, hiding eager eyes as Spike dips his head. Presses his mouth to the racing pulse point just below Jet’s ear, then further down, to lick his throat, the juncture of his neck. 

“You call the shots,” Spike mumbles, body falling slack under Jet’s hands, his calloused palms that knead the muscles of Spike’s back. Soothe down his spine, the maze of scars that spread out like a chain of fault lines.

“Biggest bullshit I ever heard.”

“Take off your shirt and squeeze my ass.”

Jet chuckles, rough, as he complies. Strips off his top. Moves deft fingers to Spike’s thin tie. “Off or on?”

“Off.”

The tie comes off, Spike's hands on Jet’s broad chest as he’s undressed with skilful ease. He shivers at the loss of clothing; pants, jacket on the floor, socks drooping from the coffee table. Boxer shorts in Jet’s hand until they’re tossed across the room.

“C’mere.” 

Jet settles Spike deeper in his lap. Groans as their groins knock together, a bump and then a grind. He’s squeezing Spike’s ass like he asked, a sensual, rhythmic clenching of palms that cup Spike’s cheeks in full, coveting and steady. 

Jet kisses Spike, then. Slides sturdy fingers to Spike's jaw, smooth where Jet’s rough. _Weathered_. Spike’s always liked his men rugged if not cruel, and that’s got Jet and Vicious covered. 

_Oh, fuck_ —Jet’s mouth. 

Spike whines as a forceful tongue rolls against his, rubbing and pushing and _oh_. Hot, wet and probing. Spike bets that tongue could wrestle a giant squid to the bottom of the ocean. He gives back as good as he gets. Gets his teeth on Jet’s red lips and nips, sucks right after he bites. 

“Careful there, stargazer,” Jet gets out with a throaty snarl that shoots directly to Spike’s cock. Makes it twitch all kinds of stupid. 

Spike laughs, careless and loud, and if it’s a little breathless, well, he can’t be blamed. 

Says, “You like it when I make you bleed.” Then, just to prove it, Spike clamps down hard, incisors piercing flesh, and Jet—he _moans_. “That’s it. That’s what I’m sayin’.” Spike laughs, again.

A ripple runs through Jet’s hulking body. Spike _feels_ it tense. “Fuckin’ smartass,” Jet growls.

“Get your dick out.”

“Nah, I think I’ll wait.”

“C’mon, old man,” Spike goads.

“ _No_.”

Naked, lithe and writhing on Jet’s thighs like a dog in heat, Spike takes that as a challenge. To make Jet beg. Get him worked up. Give him no choice. 

He leans back, grasps his own cock. Holds Jet’s heavy gaze as he grins then spits, frothy saliva dripping onto the fist that he has closed around his length. Spike slicks himself up. Watches Jet watching him. The way his eyes follow the movement: a loose grip over the head, a tight, wet glide back to the base, foreskin sliding as he strokes. Spike lets himself go, no room for inhibitions—not that he had them in the first place. But here, right now, there’s nothing he wouldn’t do to make Jet lose control. 

Spike moans, all light and airy, as he works his cock, wrist pumping up and down, sluggish and stubborn, jaw slack, eyes hooded.

“Shit, you’re a specimen,” Jet groans. Must like what he sees, because his head’s knocked back and he’s grinning, teeth gleaming in the warm, dim light. 

“Mm. You— _ah_ —you know it.”

“Ngh—oh, Jesus. _Spike._ ” 

There’s a tub of vaseline that they use to lube old engine parts on a lamp stand next to the couch. Jet snatches it. Tears the lid off with zealous hands. Liberally coats fingers and slips them into Spike’s sleek crack, his ass as hairless as the rest of him if you discount his untamed mop.

Spike lifts his hips in direct answer, and Jet’s fingers dip a little lower. Graze down to where Spike really needs it. Jet’s metal arm, his metal hand, they hold Spike stable as his thighs begin to shake, the satisfaction of jerking his cock and now the promise pressing at his rim, throwing him off, making Spike quiver. “Yeah, that’s the spot. Fuck, Jet. Stick ‘em in.” 

It’s worth the mention, that Jet can be gentle if he’s feeling so inclined. Today he’s not. Thick digits, jelly-wet and warm, push into Spike’s twitching hole, no pause for mercy, no respite. Spike snarls as he shoves back, his own hand dropping from his dick to flail and clutch at Jet’s big shoulders. His nails pierce skin and Jet hisses, drives his fingers in _deep_ , without remorse.

“Oh, hell yeah,” Spike cries. “Yeah, that’s it. More. I want— _ah, fuck_.”

And sometimes Jet reads his mind or, at least, that's what Spike reckons. When he knows just what Spike wants, how to make him weak. Jet’s digits flex and curl. Rub, so precise and focused, and then— _fuck_. That’s the spot. That’s it.

Spike’s knees give out. 

He collapses against Jet’s chest. His pelvis rolls, and he can feel the heavy thud of Jet’s tired heart, his hunter heart, beating off-time. Spurring his on. It seems to taunt Spike to catch up. To chase.

His blood is hot, and when Jet adds a thumb, he thinks he might burn up like fuselage, a superheated shroud of plasma trailing in his fervid wake. 

“Still so tight,” Jet murmurs, and his fingers are _working_ , four now slipping in and out—pulling, stretching—and it hurts. But this is how Spike needs it. 

It was never like this with Vicious. He just took and took and took. Would kill Spike as quick as fuck him, and there’s a dirty thrill in danger, in never knowing if you’ll walk away. Spike can’t say he didn’t crave it. For the longest time, he did. But it’s an empty, lonely road when adrenaline ebbs and you’ve got no-one on your six except yourself.

Jet and Spike, they’re equals. 

Jet and Spike, they’re partners—lovers. 

_Is he in love?_

Spike thinks maybe it’s the closest thing he’s had since the Red Dragon. 

Julia. Vicious. 

_Jet._

Everybody is someone else’s freak.

Fingers tug and twist, and Spike chokes back a sob as he mouths, greedy, at Jet’s neck. Swipes his tongue across the metal plate that holds the shattered remains of Jet’s cheekbone together. 

He feels his asshole ache. Feels the throb of Jet’s fat clothed cock between his trembling legs.

“Gonna get your dick out or what?” Spike gasps the question, gut turning yellow, orange, red. They say that that’s the coolest colour— _red_ —out here in space. But Spike begs to differ. It’s the color of thirst. Of getting fucked ‘til you can’t see straight.

“Yeah—just. Up. _Up_.” 

Jet’s fingers disappear. 

Spike takes a moment. Breathes Jet in, face tucked to Jet’s flushed throat. Petrol, soap and smoke. Some nights Jet smells like blood, a hit gone wrong, a deal gone wonky. Tonight, he smells like home, as close as Spike will ever get.

He stands so Jet can get his pants off, and then he’s right back, hovering, bony knees dug into the couch like grappling claws. His cock is hard. He grinds forward, slides his leaking tip along Jet’s velvet girth. 

“Fuck, you make me lose my mind.” From his seat, Jet’s hips buck up, and Spike, just wanting to feel his hole filled ( _oh, god!_ ), he whimpers. Sighs as Jet clutches his cheeks and pulls him near to spread him open. 

Spike’s got the vaseline. He’s got Jet’s cock in his hand, lathering it up until it glistens; and then Spike’s sinking down. 

“Ah, shit. Ah, shit—”

Jet doesn’t give him a second. 

He thrusts up and Spike sees white, synapses firing off _en masse_ , his nerves electric. Pleasure rips up his spine and he barely registers the words that are spilling from his clumsy mouth; desperate demands. _Harder, yeah. Again._

_Again._

_Again._

_Again._

He bites at his own fingers, tears at his own hair. And, oh, Jet fucks him deep. 

“Gonna tell me how it feels?” Jet’s voice is wrecked, so low it doesn’t register as human. Nicotine-scarred and primal. Lust looks good on Jet, cock pistoning, wild hips snapping, a sheen of sweat on his scratched-up chest, abs clenching with each grab of Spike’s wet rim around his dick.

“Better than a kick to the teeth,” Spike goads, and that gets Jet going. 

Brutal hands are on Spike's hips, sinking bruises into his skin. There was a time, not long ago, when Spike had thought that broken vessels blooming on his thighs, that raw, pink welts scored across his sides, that a slash of a knife, a butt of a gun, a kiss from a fist, were the only living parts of him. But _this_ kind of alive—Jet moving between his thighs, hanging on like they’ve just entered zero G, Spike feeling _everything;_ Jet’s dick, Jet’s mouth, Jet’s breath. _Jet’s messianic attention_. This makes him a living whole. 

Nothing else exists. 

Nothing else can heal him.

“Tell me that you want to come.” Jet’s tongue swipes over Spike’s ear, corded muscles pulling tight as he cranes his neck to reach the spot, arms like a vice around his waist. They pull Spike down as Jet fucks up. 

Spike's dick bounces, stiff, between them, precome leaking from the slit. The steady dribble pools, pearlescent, on the rise of Jet’s taut belly. 

“What am I, a f-fairy to grant your pornographic wish?”

Jet fucks in _hard_. Leans forward. Grabs Spike’s bottom lip between his teeth.

“Ok, ok,” Spike nods in earnest. “I— _god_ —I do. I do. I-I—”

“I wanna hear you say it.” 

Spike curls around Jet’s hulking frame, ankles crossed at the small of Jet’s broad back. Whispers, lips brushing Jet’s, hair dripping wet from pure exertion, from grabbing, surging, hanging on, “Jet, make me come.” 

Jet groans, eyes flashing. “Gah. _Fucking hell._ ” 

The pace he sets, then, is animal, rutting into Spike’s stretched hole, thumbs stroking at his entrance.

“Shit,” Spike whines. “I’m close.”

“C’mon,” Jet snarls. “C’mon. _C’mon_.”

Spike’s lighting up like a flare, mouth open as he gasps. His hands reach for his cock, even though he knows he’d come without it, but the ache is just too much. Spike sees himself in Jet’s blown eyes, pink-cheeked, hair a disaster. Warm treacle flows through his gut, spreading like sin as it unfurls. “You got me, Jet. You got me.”

Spike comes on a pitched exhale, a winded grunt.

Jet follows two thrusts behind, a loud _fuck_ spat against Spike’s temple.

And then they’re trying to slow their breathing.

Propped like a fallen tree against Jet’s solid torso, panting and sticky, Spike coughs. Begins to laugh. His body jerks in Jet’s soiled lap; jelly-smeared and dank with semen. 

“What’s so funny?” Jet rasps, about as smooth as a lightspeed trip through the belt to Ceres. 

“Nothin’. I just—” Spike shuts up. Doesn’t know how to say that it’s just hit him after all this time—that he’s happy. That he’s in—

“It’s nothin’, alright?” Spike shakes his head. “I’m good.”

“Fucking half-assed, monkey-boy.” Jet pokes at Spikes bare flank. 

Spike shies away as he giggles. Even jaded killers aren’t immune to tickles. “Lucky you’re you. Don’t let no-one else call me names.” He sighs. Sounds so much younger than the years entered in his file— _twenty-seven._

Jet, at thirty-six, feels so much older. A hundred, thousand lifetimes old, when Spike is soft against his body, cradled in his arms. He tells Spike that. 

Spike tells him to shut up. Says, “The only thing that’s old is this come-sodden, cut-rate couch. I’m gonna get us a new one. Modular. Real flash.”

“Yeah?” Jet entertains. “You and what woolongs?” 

“I’ll think of somethin’.”

“Yeah.” Jet grins. “You always do.” 

They crowd together for a little while, just holding on and feeling each other's ribs swell and draw in. 

Spike starts to drift. Memories dredge from his right eye, the one that’s lighter, artificial.

_Moonlight through a stained-glass window. A steel barrel to a ceded head. A fall greater than an exiled angel. Julia. Sheets, white sheets._

_Vicious._

_Jet._

_Just like that… sing for me._

_Spike, what’s your rush?_

_What’s your rush?_

_What’s your_ —

“Hey.” Jet brings him back. “Stargazer, you with me?”

“Sure,” Spike replies. He’s still got one foot in the graveyard, one pulled grenade clenched in his fist.

“Mm-hmm,” Jet murmurs, doubtful. Announces, “Time for bed.”

“ _Hmph_ —whatever,” Spike huffs as Jet hauls him up. Bodily drags him through the inner hull, past the lav, into their quarters. 

And the last thing that Spike hears before his brain shuts off, before his vision clouds, thoughts weaved to strata, is a whisper in his ear—

_Have a sweet ride, stargazer._

* * *

The night is endless out here in space. A streak of light across the ether, a burning discharge from a worn-out star, pressure pushing back against collapse. That’s all that breaks it up _—_ the strangling night that stretches from gate to gate, planet to planet, moon to moon. 

The Bebop drifts, with a clunk and whirr. They ran out of gas four days ago, neither of them bothered to do a supply run or send for help. 

“If you could do it again, what would you change?”

“This? You. _Uh_ —you mean us?”

“Life.” Jet’s on his back, cybernetic arm across his chest, the other _—_ flesh and blood and _warm—_ is tucked beneath his head, trapped between the pillow and what’s left of the black dog’s hair. 

“Nothin’.”

“Really?”

“It’s not bad _—_ this life,” Spike says, low, no more than a whisper. “‘S long as there’s an end.”

“You don’t believe in rebirth?”

“I barely believe I shit. Why, do you?”

“Yeah, I guess.” Jet reaches across, pulls the smoke from Spike’s dry lips. The hit he takes is long and deep. Ash clings in a flimsy column between the tip and tar-soaked butt. “You know…”

It’s dark. 

Jet talks in the dark. 

Spike waits. 

“... a great man,” Jet continues after a pause, “once said ‘as long as you are not aware of the continual law of Die and Be Again, you are merely a vague guest on a dark Earth’.”

“Lucky we’re not on Earth, then.” Spike softly laughs. “You think your Charlie Parker would quote Goethe?”

Jet rolls his eyes. Ignores the goading. “You know, sometimes I think I’ve been reborn already. The world spins backwards every day. We’re thrown into the past, then driven forward, a million miles ahead. My old life is just a dream, Spike. A world away, all halting frames bled dry of color. The hate, it disappeared. Change gave me a chance”—he puts the smoke out on his arm, embers dropping to the bed—“another and another. Gave me you, deserved or not. Whatever it is, I feel new. I feel redeemed.”

“Still got the scars.” Spike’s voice is tight, like it gets when Jet mentions _them_. There’s a high blush on his cheeks and grim resolve in tired eyes. “Still missing parts you won’t get back. And, you and me—no vindication. We don’t get excused.”

“Maybe. But, the scars? This arm? It’s the price I paid. I take them as a warning. A reminder. ‘Don’t fuck up’.”

“Yeah?” Spike scoffs, all this talk, all these _emotions_ , making him fidget like a child. “Then explain to me how the hell we ended up with an empty tank, no goddamned food and a safe full of fake whiskey.”

“’Cause I picked up a suicidal dumbass who can’t report a broken fuel dial and can’t tell apple juice from liquor.”

“Told you ‘bout that dial three months ago.”

“Bullshit.”

“I did.”

“Oh yeah?”

“ _Yes_. Probably. I mean, shit, there’s always _something_ wrong with this ship.”

Jet tuts. “This ship is a goddess.”

“Like fuck it is.”

“You shut your mouth.”

“Beat me at pool,” Spike contests, “and I might.”

What he doesn’t say is that this goddamn hunk of alloy might have saved his hide more than once or twice. Kept Spike six feet above ground, out of a cemetery in Tharsis.

“So, you don’t believe in reincarnation?” Jet probes again, stubborn as Spike when he gets rolling.

“Once around works fine for me.” Spike turns to face Jet better. Nudges him with a foot, searching for warmth; the sheets are thin and the room is getting chilly. “There’s peace in acceptance. Death is what we deal in. It’s our job, what we dish out. What we’ll finally get paid in.”

“Jesus, Spike.”

“Is what it is.”

Jet studies him for a moment, a warm thing that makes Spike squirm. Funny how Jet can just do that—make Spike blush. A little eye-contact. A few too-honest words. “You have another nightmare?”

Too insightful, is what Jet is.

Spike’s face closes over, lips twitching on a dozen automatic lies. Bad dreams; they never stay gone long. “Nope.”

“Yeah, right. You haven’t slept without almost choking me since that clusterfuck in Spaceland.”

“Pierre Le Fou didn’t stand a chance,” Spike deflects, brash. Punches the air, a quick one, two; his fallback, fighters’ machismo, bested only by jokes. 

Jet chuckles. Rests his palm on Spike’s warm side. “Keep telling yourself that, space cowboy.”

With a twinkle in his eye, a defiant jut of his sharp chin, Spike jabs a thumb at his own chest. “Hothead who defies all.”

“'Hothead'. Got that part right. Dunno about the rest.”

Just short of a snort, Spike huffs. Grabs another Marlboro red and fumbles around for Jet’s gold Zippo. He sparks up. Blows the first plume of smoke straight at Jet’s lips. Jet opens up, a quick inhale, and then he’s springing forward, kissing spike hard before he can take another drag. 

“You know, Jet,” Spike says, breathless, as he pulls away and peers up from where Jet’s pressed him to the mattress. “Wherever I go, there’ll be bad luck.”

“Fuel, booze and money—easy come, easy go.” Jet shrugs. “It ain’t got nothin’ to do with luck.”

“One day I’ll get you killed.”

It sobers the air between them, the heat that was there, falling away.

Jet gives him a searching look, disquiet pinching up his features. Then he’s slapping on a smile. “Guess you’re lucky I’ll get another shot.”

Spike eyes Jet like he’s crazy. “You’ll be touching back down alone.”

“That’s where you’re wrong, stargazer.” Jet says it like he’s never been more sure in his life. He stretches up, hits the light-switch. It plunges them into black, the glow of Spike’s smoke the only beacon. Jet watches it burn down. “I’ll drag you outta hell myself. You just watch.”

* * *

Spike wakes up soaked in sweat.

There’s too little air in his rancid lungs and a looping reel that won’t stop playing in his head—

Cut from the tether, he’s free-floating, gravity lost outside the ship. He’s got his spacesuit on, but it’s so damn cold that he can’t blink, can’t take a breath. And he’s trying to say _hey, Jet. Hey, this is it. I’m gonna die. Jet, I’m not ready. Jet, please wait. Jet, please don’t go._

_Jet._

_Jet._

Then the Bebop’s just a dot. A fading star in an expanse that’s there one minute, nothing more than dust in a soundless vacuum the next. 

There’s life and then there’s death. 

There’s loss and then there’s—

 _Fuck_. 

Spike can’t even bring himself to say it. 

Nothing makes him worth it. But when Jet cracks a sleepy eye and croaks, _stargazer, you alright?,_ just like he always does when Spike gets caught up in bad dreams—it’s a damned near thing, those three mad words. 

_Hey, Jet, wanna hear something funny?_

_I think that I’m in—_

Spike thinks that he’ll be gone, nothing left but a fine, pink mist as a gunshot echoes at his back, before he lets himself just feel it. Still, he can’t ignore it’s there, terrifying and beautiful and banging in his heart, in their shared smokes, in their shared bed. In the blood they spill, mandated. 

Live and kill together, and with all the poetic perversion of a martyr, die alone.

“Yeah,” Spike answers, delayed. “I got this one nailed shut.” 

But Jet’s already back in dreamland, soft snores and gentle breaths, and Spike’s not sorry that Jet missed it _—_ the waver in his voice. 

Five billion years from now, when the Sun distends and dwarfs, there’ll be one last quintessential moment, the parallax of the universe rewritten as the solar system finally revolts. And Spike’s seen stars go supernova, nebula fuse and break apart, opened a deal on an ace and 10 of clubs in a royal flush in blackjack. But, here, on the Bebop, out of gas, as the generators start to stutter and the lights begin to flicker, Spike knows it’s true when he looks at the hunter who’s killed men with nothing but his metal hand _—_

_Anything I’ve ever seen, it ain’t as good as you._

* * *

Spike's got one hand between the mattress, a can of Pippu in the other. Takes swig of cola and grabs his Jericho 941. He’s humming a tune, polishing the empty barrel with the top sheet when Jet wakes up.

“Morning, sunshine,” Spike drawls. “Got a lead on a bounty head in Ganymede. Up for a hunt?”

Not one for talking before coffee, Jet just mutters, “Gas.”

“It’s on its way.”

“Wonders never cease.” Jet peers up from a flattened pillow. “You feeling lucky?

Spike wiggles his eyebrows. “How much time we got?”

“I wasn’t—” Jet strangles a groan. “Keep it in your pants or start the clock.” 

Spike grins, a flash of teeth, an impish glint in his eye. “Heads or tails,” he says. Puts the muzzle of his handgun to Jet’s temple. Jet doesn’t flinch. “Heads, I paint the room with your brains and keep it decent; tails, you got thirty minutes or less to get me off. What’s your call, old man?”

“You wanna my test my rebirth theory?”

Spike shrugs, still grinning. “Whatever happens, happens. Call it.”

Jet rolls his eyes. “Heads.”

And then Spike’s laughing as he lunges, kisses Jet full on the mouth. 

Pulls the trigger and says, _bang!_

  
  
  



End file.
